CAWD

Class hours: 9:40am – 2:05pm
Mr. Cronin
Mr. Herr

Notes

• Iguazu Waterfalls in Northern Argentina.
• Students that are to stay after today…make sure you are here at 2:05 and have made plans to stay until 3.
• 7 students have yet to turn in their Pin Design Sketch draft #1 which was due Thursday before Thanksgiving week.  It isn’t due to be graded until today, so you aren’t late if you get it in…today…but you need to hand me this sketch.  If you don’t know if you did or not check your gradebook; I already graded the sketches turned in. 

Example Files

9:40 Attendance and Article

9:45 Morning Max Content:  Plane / Edge Modeling

• Creating shapes without starting at primitives

10:25 Morning Typography Exercise:  Picking Serif and Sans-Serif fonts

First a little review of the font related vocab.

This morning you are going to use the internet to find some new fonts.  I like dafont.com, but as long as you they are free to use you can get them wherever.

You will load the file in our example files called “fontExerciseBlank.psd”.  You will find a serif and sans-serif font to use, download, and install on your computer.  You will then type out the name of the font on the left hand side, and give a demonstration of what it looks like by typing out the classic “A quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog”.  This is commonly found when working with fonts so you can see it in action.

An example I created as a demonstration:

When complete save your file as “fontDemo.jpg” and “fontDemo.psd” and upload to your Week 12 folder.

10:45 Break (15 Minutes)

11:00 Tuesday through Friday Animation Project:  Welcome to the CAWD Cinemas Animation.

Last week we worked on the Akira project, where your cut scene animation was setting the scene for the next phase of a video game.  Today we will start working on an animation to tell a story.  The #1 job for an animator is to be able to tell a story.  At the national 3D Visualization and Animation Competition last year the judges from big design and special effects companies said that ability to tell a story, to get a message across, what the number 1 goal of the competition, and what they look for when hiring talent.  What software you used, what type of reflection, what type of renderer, how many polys you used, how fast your computer was…none of this was as important to your ability to tell a story.  Today you will start the first step in this journey in this by conveying meaning through static object animation (no characters).

Over portions of the next 4 mornings you are going to work on an animation project as a individual.  You will choose one of the 3 messages that need to be conveyed and create an animation which solves the requirements through design. 

The topic will be creating the intro animation you see at the start of movies at a Movie Theater.  Often conveying themes of be quiet, eat food, throw out your own garbage, these are some last minute requests from the movie theater so everyone has a good experience.

Regal does a good job at this.

You will work as an animator to convey the messages a typical theater may have.  I imagine you will use both text and imagery in your productions.  Your product needs to be much more than simple text animations. What you model / how well you model it will be factored as much as the animation in your grade.  If for the “Turn off your cell phone” component you have text come on screen that says…”Turn off your cell phone”…and that’s it, you won’t have done enough to get an acceptable grade.

The 3 messages your can pick from to convey:

1. Enjoy Concessions / Throw Away your trash
   • Buy/eat popcorn, candy, soda, nachos, etc
   • Make sure the concessions and napkins get to the trash
2. Turn off your cell phone / be quiet
   • Turn your devices off and do no talk to others
3. Welcome to CAWD Cinemas / Enjoy the Show
   • This is two separate animations.  This will require less complex modeling, but more animation.  Think of this when you are selecting which section you complete.
   • “Welcome to CAWD Cinemas” (the first thing we see)
   • “Enjoy the Show” (the last thing we see)
   • Create some sort of logo / visual for CAWD Cinemas

Each individual animation will require:

• story boarding out your component
• modeling of specific elements for message
• animation of these elements to get your message across
• rendering out of your shot of the the animation, and including sound

Steps to complete

1. Storyboard out your specific animation you are responsible for – this must be turned in by everyone by Lunch. - Tuesday
   
2. Model what you need for your animation - Wednesday / Thursday
3. Animate - Thursday / Friday
4. Render your clip  – Thursday / Friday / Over the Weekend
   
5. Put together in Premiere -> add sounds - Friday / Monday
   
6. Export and upload.   Friday / Monday
   

By lunch time on Friday save your file as “movies.mp4″ and make sure it is uploaded to every group members Week 12 folder.

Extra Credit Option

Students that wish to get extra credit may do the following extra work for 1 letter grade bump. (C->B, B->A).

• Find 2 other students that have “the other” messages for the pre-film clip.
• Combine all three of your projects into one movie.
• The person putting everything together should consider some sort of unifying background track for the entire production.  NOT something readily identifiable, not Blink (Decker), not Tyler the Creator (Colton), or the Biebes (Sam).  Listen to the Regal example again to get an idea of what you need to look for.
• Upload this additional clip as “moviesGroup.mp4″ to your Week 12 folder.
• The clever among you will say “Hey, I want extra credit now” and PLAN to have all three.  Groups are not mutually exclusive, for example if Bowan chooses to animate “Turn off your cell phone / be quiet”, his animation could be used in more than one group.  His work could be used with Keith and Anna, and also with Alex and Jamie.

12:00 Lunch (25 Minutes)

12:25 Attendance and Article

12:25 Quiet Production Time

12:45 Afternoon Max Glow Project for students not here Monday:  Pop Neon

Look back to the Monday afternoon exercise.

Afternoon Max Glow Exercise for Anna and Colton:  Glow Art 

As the 2 of you have already practiced the Pop Neon from yesterday, you will today work on creating some sort of Glow Art taking your skills to the next level.

This assignment does NOT need to be ad advertisement such as the Chevy Trucks sign above, or the Minnesota football helmet.  It could be something specific such as the old car / pig with chefs hat, or something abstract / creative for the sake of art like the loops at the end.

I will give you full reigns of creative control on this project -> make it look as good as you can.  Create a single render at 1280 x 720 called “neonArt.jpg” and upload to your Week 12 folder.

2:05 Dismissal